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Further resources can be found on the Prairie Conservation Action Plan's (PCAP) website at: http://www.pcap-sk.org/resources-literature, including information on communities of each ecosite type.The map of range ecosites was developed by Jeff Thorpe and Nick Nicolichuk of Saskatchewan Research Council, under a project of the Saskatchewan Prairie Conservation Action Plan with major funding support from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s Greencover Canada Program. Extensive assistance in developing the map was provided by Alvin Anderson of the Land Resource Unit, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. In a second phase of the project, with major funding support from Saskatchewan Ministry of the Environment, the ecosite map was slightly revised. The overall project, including the classification of range ecosites, is documented in the following publication:Thorpe, J. 2014. Saskatchewan Rangeland Ecosystems, Publication 1: Ecoregions and Ecosites, Version 2. Saskatchewan Prairie Conservation Action Plan. Saskatchewan Research Council Pub. No. 11881-1E14.The map is based on a seamless digital soil coverage of southern Saskatchewan, provided by the Land Resource Unit of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. The map projection is UTM Zone 13, and the datum has been converted to NAD83. The soil map shows polygons which are linked to a database showing soil map unit, slope class, surface texture, and other properties. The original soil map extended into the forest fringe of central Saskatchewan. Because the focus of the ecosite classification was on native grassland, the range ecosite map was trimmed to the area of the Prairie Ecozone.To develop the range ecosite map, a database of soil series provided by the Land Resource Unit was used to determine the closest equivalent range ecosite, by interpretation of properties such as mode of deposition, parent material texture, gleying, salinity, and erosion. The resulting translation of soil series to ecosites is given in the following publication:Thorpe, J. 2014. Saskatchewan Rangeland Ecosystems, Publication 2: Soil Series Table, Version 2. Saskatchewan Prairie Conservation Action Plan. Saskatchewan Research Council Pub. No. 11881-2E14.Each soil map unit has a dominant soil series, and the range ecosite corresponding to that series was assigned to the map unit. Ecosite assignments were then modified using other attributes of the mapped areas, including surface texture and slope class. The resulting translation of soil map units to range ecosites is given in the following publication:Thorpe, J. 2014. Saskatchewan Rangeland Ecosystems, Publication 3: Map Unit Table, Version 2. Saskatchewan Prairie Conservation Action Plan. Saskatchewan Research Council Pub. No. 11881-3E14.The translation of map units to range ecosites was applied to the database of soil properties to determine the dominant range ecosite for each polygon. The resulting column of ecosite assignments was added to the database in the field SITE3, and used to generate the map of range ecosites. This field has been renamed here as RangelandEcosites. The following abbreviations are used in RangelandEcosites:ABBREV.RANGE ECOSITEBDBadlandsCYClayFPFen PeatGRGravellyHDHigh DunesLDLow DunesLMLoamMHMarshMHSASaline MarshOROrganic(fen,bog)OVOverflowOVSASaline OverflowOVSOSolonetzic OverflowSDSandSLSandy LoamSOSolonetzicSUBSubirrigatedSUBSASaline SubirrigatedTHThinUCUnclassified (e.g urban areas, industrial sites, water)UPSASaline UplandWMDWet MeadowWMDSASaline Wet MeadowIn a 2016 revision, ecosites were predicted for not only the dominant soil, but also the second, third or fourth soils listed for many polygons. The proportions of these soils were used to generate a label showing the complex of ecosites making up the polygon. For example, the label “LM55 / GR20 / WMD15 / SUB10” indicates that 55% of the polygon is Loam, 20% Gravelly, 15% Wet Meadow, and 10% Subirrigated. This label is in the field SITE4. |